How do I install Iolite on my PC?

Please see the step-by-step tutorial on the Video Tutorials page, or follow the instructions below.

For those who are completely new to iolite:

Install Igor Pro on your computer following the instructions given on the Wavemetric website. You can download the Igor Pro installer, and use the serial number and activation key sent to you in an email from Iolite.

Install iolite using the iolite installer. You should have received an email from iolite with a link to the iolite 3 download. Download that file and install iolite 3 by double-clicking the installer.

Run Igor Pro as an administrator by right-clicking on the Igor Pro item in the start menu and selecting “Run as administrator”. When Igor Pro starts up, you should see a small Iolite welcome image with “Loading…” written on it.

When prompted, click Yes to start the 7 day trial. You will need to make sure your internet connection is working before starting the trial. Once you’ve clicked Yes, you should see a window saying that your trial has started, and when the end date is. You now have a fully functional trial working on your machine.

To register Iolite, go to the iolite menu, and select About Iolite -> Register iolite. Then enter your details, along with the iolite licence key you received in your email from iolite. Click OK, and you should see a message thanking you for registering Iolite. You are now using a fully licensed version of Iolite 3.

For those who have iolite v2.x already installed on their computer:

Make sure that you have the latest version of Igor Pro on your computer. Check for updates using the item in the Igor Pro Help menu.

You will need to delete the links to iolite v2.x. You can do this by going to

“C:\Users\[Your User Home]\Documents\WaveMetrics\Igor Pro 6 User Files\Igor Procedures” and delete any Iolite related files there. There should be three shortcut files to delete.

Install Iolite using the iolite installer. You should have received an email from Iolite with a link to the iolite 3 download. Download that file and install iolite 3 by double-clicking the installer.

Run Igor Pro as an administrator by right-clicking on the Igor Pro item in the start menu and selecting “Run as administrator”. When Igor Pro starts up, you should see a small iolite welcome image with “Loading…” written on it.

When prompted, click Yes to start the 7 day trial. You will need to make sure your internet connection is working before starting the trial. Once you’ve clicked Yes, you should see a window saying that your trial has started, and when the end date is. You now have a fully functional trial working on your machine.

To register Iolite, go to the Iolite menu, and select About Iolite -> Register iolite. Then enter your details, along with the iolite licence key you received in your email from iolite. Click OK, and you should see a message thanking you for registering iolite. You are now using a fully licensed version of iolite 3.

I am getting a new computer and need to move my iolite license, can I deregister my iolite license key so I can use it in a different computer?

If you need to uninstall and reinstall iolite on the same computer or install iolite on a different computer, you can deregister your iolite license to allow for one more validation. To do this just go to the iolite menu and select iolite > About iolite > deregister iolite. This would reset your license key so you can use it to register iolite again after a new install. Just make sure you have a working internet connection on both computers when deregistering/registering.

and delete any iolite related files there. There should be three shortcut files to delete.

You can then delete the iolite v3 folder from your Program Files folder. Iolite doesn’t make any registry edits during install, so this is all that is required to remove iolite from your system. See the wavemetrics webpage for info on uninstalling Igor Pro.

My tabs don’t appear right? Is it a scaling issue?

You may have some issues on Windows 8 machines if you have your display settings scaled to greater than 100%. It might appear like this:

If so, you need to go to the Personalize control panel by right-clicking on your Desktop and selecting “Personalize”. This will take you to the Control Panel for Display. There, change the screen scaling to 100%, as per the image below:

Then restart Igor and you should be good to go!

I keep getting an “expected string expression” error. What do I do?

After you’ve been prompted to enter text into iolite (such as during licence activation) you might see a dialogue telling you that Igor expected a string expression, with a window that looks something like this:

This is just an issue where if you enter some text into an Igor prompt, it needs the text to be surrounded by double quotation marks. Just make sure that the text you enter into the prompt has an ” at the start and end of your text, and you should be good to go!

I keep getting a “Possible bug (or corrupt data, or …)“ error message when opening an experiment. How do I fix it?

If you encounter the above dialogue after opening an experiment, please complete the following troubleshooting steps:

1. Click ‘Quit Macro’. A second pop-up window will appear that look like this:

2. Click ‘OK’. This will allow you to continue opening the experiment, but with some errors.

3. To correct those errors and restore your experiment, go to the Iolite Menu and select ‘Reset Experiment’. Once the restore is complete you should be able to access your data and continue using Iolite successfully.

Troubleshooting tip: This issue occurs when the information displayed on the report windows found on the Import and DRS tabs are not saved correctly. It can be avoided by selecting any tab other than the Import or DRS tab before saving your experiment.

I keep getting the error message “expected a keyword or an object name” when starting Igor Pro. What do I do?

You may encounter a ‘Function Compilation Error’ message that looks like the one below when launching Igor Pro:

This error usually occurs because Iolite cannot find the EasyHTTP.xop file in the Igor Extensions folder. To solve this issue:

Quit Igor Pro

Move the EasyHTTP.xop file from the iolite v3.32 download folder to:

Documents/Wavemetrics/Igor Pro User files/Igor Extensions

You should be able to launch Igor Pro without any issues now.

If the problem persists after you have moved the EasyHTTP.xop file to the correct location, please try one of the following troubleshooting steps:

Some Mac users have reported issues with the EasyHTTP extension not working. To fix this, just rename the easyHTTP_MAC.xop file to easyHTTP.xop.

For PC users, it is possible that the issue may be caused by a conflict with OneDrive’s automatic file saving options. Please quit Igor Pro and check your auto-save settings in OneDrive:

Right-click the OneDrive icon on the Notification Area and click on ‘Settings’.

On the Auto-Save tab, choose to save Documents to “This PC Only”.

Click ‘OK’ and restart Igor Pro. Iolite should start correctly now.

How is iolite installed and linked to Igor Pro? How do I check if iolite has installed properly?

iolite is run within Igor Pro as a series of scripts. Although ‘scripts’ sounds rather simple, currently these scripts are about 40,000 lines of code that handle everything from importing the raw data from your mass spectrometer, through to display and advanced data handling. These scripts are what are contained within your iolite v3 folder, along with a few other files, like standard files etc.

Igor Pro automatically reads these scripts when it starts up and then the functionality within the scripts is available to you the iolite user. If Igor Pro doesn’t read these scripts, you have just a basic installation of Igor Pro (which is very powerful by itself, but not what you need if you’re trying to work with mass spec data).

So, how does Igor Pro read these scripts automatically? Well, when Igor Pro starts it looks in two places for additional scripts to load. These are:

In the Igor Procedures folder within the Igor Pro 6.x Folder within your Applications folder, or Program Files folder, depending on whether you’re on Mac or PC, respectively.

By default, it should be the second of these two places, but for various reasons (related to installation and access privileges) it may be in the former folder.

There should be three iolite related files in one of these folders:

a shortcut (alias) file called IoliteAddOns that points to the Add Ons folder within your iolite 3 folder

another shortcut (alias) file called IoliteApplication that points to the Global Procedures folder within your iolite 3 folder

another shortcut (alias) file called IoliteMenuToggle.ipf that points to a file called IoliteMenuToggle.ipf within your iolite 3 folder

If you are having troubles with your iolite installation, it is likely due to some issue with these three files. Here are some possibilities:

They might not be there;

They may be pointing to the wrong version of iolite; or

They might be in both of the folders Igor Pro checks at start up.

Let’s look at these three cases in order:

The three iolite files are not in either of the folders. This assumes that you were able to find both folders, and they were empty, or contained other files, but no iolite files. This can happen for a couple of reasons. Firstly, the importer may not have had enough access privileges to put the shortcut files there (although usually the importer will tell you this). If this is the case, run the importer again, ensuring that you have full admin access. If after running the importer again you still have no iolite related files in either of these two locations, you can manually make these shortcut files. On Mac, right click on the Global Procedures folder within your iolite v3 folder and select Make Alias. Then rename the newly created alias as IoliteApplication. Repeat for the Add ons folder, calling the alias IoliteAddOns. Don’t worry about the IoliteMenuToggle.ipf alias at this stage. For PC, perform the normal steps required to make a shortcut file to the folders described. Then put these new alias/shortcut files into the Documents*\Wavemetrics\Igor Pro User files\Igor Procedures folder (*My Documents for PC). Then restart Igor Pro and see if iolite loads. If you weren’t able to copy the shortcut files to that folder, there is a permissions issue, and you should contact your local IT support to allow you to fix this.

If the shortcuts are pointing to the wrong version of iolite (you can check by double-clicking on them to see where you end up), you can delete these files and manually create new shortcut files as described above. Or, you can change their target (here’s how on PC, and on Mac).

If there are shortcuts in both locations Igor Pro checks at startup, you will get a “Function Compilation Error” telling you that some “name already exists as a function”. This case is the easiest to fix. Just look in both locations, work out which one has the shortcuts to the older version of iolite, and delete those shortcuts… BUT, if you’re unsure about deleting these files for good, just move them to your Desktop, restart Igor Pro and see if it works. If you got it wrong, you can always put the files on your Desktop back in the place you found them and delete the others.

If you are still unable to solve your installation issue after following the above guide, please check the iolite 3 forums which may have the solution. If not, please feel free to post to the forum. If you do not have a forum log-in, just download the free trial version of iolite. It will create a user account for you when you do, and you can use this login info to log into the forums.

Is iolite compatible with my mass spectrometer?

We currently support the following mass spectrometers:

Nu Plasma I and II (MC-ICPMS)

Nu AttoM

Thermo Fisher Neptune (MC-ICPMS)

Thermo Fisher Triton (MC-TIMS)

Thermo Fisher Element2

Thermo Fisher iCapQ

Thermo Fisher X Series

Agilent 4500/7500/7700

Spectro ICPMS

Perkin Elmer Elan

Bruker (Varian) ICPMS

If your machine is not on the list above then please feel free to contact us, as we’re always willing to build new importers for mass spectrometers that we haven’t encountered before.

What types of mass spectrometry can I use iolite for?

Iolite’s longest history is with laser ablation ICPMS and we can say with confidence that it is the most advanced software available for laser work. Iolite is setting new standards for laser imaging and has tried and tested data reduction schemes for trace elements, U-Pb geochronology, and numerous isotope-ratio protocols.
It may surprise some to learn that iolite is also great for other approaches – multiple labs use iolite routinely for solution-mode isotope ratio measurement, and a robust data reduction scheme for solution mode trace element analysis is in the pipeline. In addition, iolite excels in reducing TIMS data, and we are currently working on strategies for reducing data from other types of mass spectrometry such as OES and time-of-flight, noble gas mass spectrometry and LC-ICPMS.

Which laser systems is Iolite compatible with?

Iolite can process data collected using any laser system and its imaging capabiliities are flexible enough that standard trace element images can be created without coordinate information from the laser (i.e., a laser log file). However, if you wish to take advantage of iolite’s unique “Cellspace” and mineral-mapping capabilities a compatible laser log file containing a record of positioning coordinates is required. At present Resonetics and Photon laser systems provide laser log files that are fully compatible with iolite’s advanced imaging features.

What user support is offered for Iolite?

Despite being a commercial software package, we believe in keeping Iolite as transparent and flexible for users as possible. As such, in addition to providing technical support to our users we will also gladly explain how data is treated within Iolite, help users to fully understand (and modify) data reduction schemes, and provide more general advice such as strategies for data acquisition.
In addition to providing direct one-on-one advice via email we encourage our users to participate in our forum so that information and improvements can be shared across the entire analytical community. And finally, we create videos and blog posts to explain common issues, clarify how certain features work, and showcase new features.

What is iolite’s Privacy Policy?

Being part of The University of Melbourne, we abide by the university’s privacy policy. Occasionally, iolite customers send us data files, either to help with solving their data reduction issues, or for bug fixing. We take your data privacy very seriously. We do not share your data with anyone without your written permission. Any data that you send to us will be deleted once the issue that lead to you sending the data has been resolved. We also usually ask that users send us “anonymous data”; that is, data that we couldn’t possibly identify the samples measured, or even if we could, it wouldn’t make any difference because we lack any context for these samples.

If you have any questions about iolite and your data privacy, please do not hesitate to contact us at support@iolite-software.com